


Concerning Trauma

by Bluefall



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-27
Updated: 2017-02-27
Packaged: 2018-09-27 07:47:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9983852
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bluefall/pseuds/Bluefall
Summary: A brief re-write of the scene between Kara and Maggie in 2x13, in recognition of Kara's established empathy and the commonalities between them that the show has not yet explored.





	

It hadn't exactly been a _fight_ , that she'd had with Alex on Valentine's Day, but it still hung over her with a dull, heavy pressure that stopped up her throat and jammed her fingers whenever she managed to queue up Alex's number on her phone. Simply calling to apologize, or even just texting to ask if she wanted to meet for lunch, felt both impossible and insulting, and so she found herself – without any professional excuse whatsoever – wandering the halls of the DEO in the vague hope of at least addressing things in person.

And she did find a Danvers, but it was entirely the wrong one, and Kara's polite but exhausted greeting – “Hey, Maggie, have you seen Alex?” – certainly meant she wouldn't be finding her girlfriend any time soon.

It was never a bad idea to be on Kara's good side, though, so in the spirit of not wasting her trip entirely, she offered, “No, I was looking for her too, actually. I was kind of a jerk last night and I'm trying to find her so I can apologize.”

Kara's face turned so earnest and urgent so quickly it was almost adorable. “You definitely don't need to worry, Maggie. I can promise you she doesn't think you're a jerk.”

“She told you that?”

Kara looked slightly sheepish on her sister's behalf. “Well she actually said she was a terrible girlfriend who didn't know how to listen and should never have let herself believe she could be in an adult relationship. I... extrapolated?”

“See, and _that's_ why I need to apologize,” said Maggie. “I told her that I hated all the manufactured cliché chocolate and flowers stuff, so she tried to do something personalized and sincere. That's not 'not listening,' it's actually really sweet. I didn't explain myself honestly, and then I yelled at her for not reading my mind.”

That earned her a slow, thoughtful shake of the head from Kara. “Alex does sometimes... jump to conclusions, and I think I maybe encouraged her, which honestly _I'd_ like to apologize for. I'm really sorry if I made things worse. And even if you weren't clear, it's not easy to be eloquent when you're hurting.”

“She told you that, too, huh,” grumbled Maggie, suddenly wary.

“Nothing specific,” said Kara with an easy shrug. “Just that the day brought up bad memories.”

Maggie's irritation subsided, soothed by Alex's discretion, and that was... probably not fair, to be honest. She knew more about Kara than she had a right to, after all, just by knowing her alter ego; evening the scales a little was only just, and so she admitted, with a shrug of her own,

“It's the anniversary of getting kicked out of my house for being gay. Not my favorite experience.”

“Oh, Maggie....”

“Don't – No. Don't do that, with the face and the sympathy and the puppy dog eyes, I'm trying to be offhand here and if you get all emotional on me I won't be able to, and I am _not_ going to cry in the middle of the damn DEO.”

“Right. No sympathy. Sorry,” said Kara firmly, adjusting her glasses and settling into a casual, friendly demeanor. “But, do you mind if I say one thing?”

“Depends what you're going to say, I guess,” said Maggie cautiously.

Kara paused for a moment, maybe searching for the English she wanted, before asking, “Did Alex tell you why we were supposed to hang out the night you guys went to that concert?”

“Yeah, the anniversary of you landing on Earth, right? I'm sorry about that, by the way, I would have –”

“No, don't apologize, it's fine, that's not what I was getting at,” interrupted Kara. “What I meant was...”

She closed her eyes and took off her glasses, taking a deep breath.

“The day I landed on Earth was the worst day of my life. From my perspective, anyway – my spaceship, it wasn't really a _spaceship_ , it was a stasis pod, so I was out there for years and years, but the whole time, I was asleep. Not thinking, not dreaming, not... aware. For me, it was like I closed my eyes with my planet dying barely a handful of light-years behind me, and I opened them again a few seconds later with this...” she huffed a laugh. “ _Stranger_ standing over me, wearing the crest of my house, in front of a _terrifying_ blue sky, who told me I'd lost even the one thing my parents told me I'd still have. All in the same few horrible hours. It was the last thing I wanted to celebrate.

“But that first anniversary, Alex made a bunch of desserts and let me use her Playstation and took me out on her dad's motorcycle – _very_ against the rules, by the way – and by the end of the day I was actually having fun. And she did it again the next year, and the next, until eventually, after all those Earth birthdays that she worked so hard to make great for me, it became a day I looked forward to, something I was actually _excited_ about. And that memory of that tiny little pod, of waking up so far from home, it kind of... lost its power.”

“Kara, I don't think –”

Kara put up her hands, her interruption too earnest to be offensive. “I would never try to diminish what you've been through. It was _terrible_ , and you have every right to be as angry and hurt about it as you want, and deal with it in any way you need to. And Alex... Alex is the best person in the world, Maggie. All that cheesy romantic stuff she never got to have growing up, she wants that _with_ you, not,” she grasped for words for a moment, eventually finishing firmly, “not at your expense. If you hate Valentine's Day until the end of time and can never stand to celebrate it, she'll understand, she won't be upset and she'll never push you.

"But if you want to make new memories, try to turn the day into something really _happy_ , there isn't anyone better to do it with.”

Kara was quiet for a moment as Maggie let that sink in.

Eventually, she shook her head helplessly. “That 'cheesy romantic stuff'.... I wouldn't even know where to start. It's not something I ever did either.”

Kara's smile was gentle, and as she stood to leave, she turned one last warm glance on Maggie before she walked out, and offered a quiet, “Then maybe this is a second chance for both of you.”

Maggie watched her go, and thought about Alex, who cared about her job as much as Maggie and threatened monsters twice her size for the people she loved and who got tiramisu and a damn bonsai tree and wanted to _listen_ even when Maggie tried to storm out and who wasn't like anyone that Maggie had ever dated or maybe even _known_ before...

... and thought that maybe, just maybe, Kara was right.


End file.
